This laboratory will develop and characterize an animal model for neural tube defects using curly tail and T (Brachyury) and culturing the mouse embryos in vitro and establishing the means of identifying the affected mutant embryos prior to their development of the neural tube defect. The model will be characterized morphologically in vitro to allow identification of future abnormal embryos and the principle investigator will provide these animal models to other investigators wishing to carry out further studies neural tube defects. These investigators will further look for extracellular matrix abnormalities in these developmental models. In addition, these mutant mice will be exposed to D-glucose in an effort to produce a model analagous to human diabetic pregnancy and to evaluate this model for enhancement of the neural tube defect. If extracellular matrix abnormalities are encountered perturbation experiments will be used to reproduce the mutant phenotype in normal embryos or prevent the abnormality in future abnormal embryos.